TRENDING
So we’re going to do a momo update today and I think it’s going to blow your mind. But first let me briefly explain what happened this morning which led me to look at those momentum and volatility charts in the first place. If you may recall yesterday’s lottery ticket on the E-Mini went bust by just a tick or two after which the SPX actually ended up bouncing back.
So I look at UVOL and it looks pretty damn bearish except of course for the late session candle painting pump. So of course I’m starting to wonder if we may be sloping over in the near term future, because with the Dollar heading into Italian Lira territory we should have busted [...]
When equities turns volatile each added gyration serves to stir the collective emotional cesspool of market participants. An unfortunate cognitive bias we as human beings all share is that we tend to see mostly what we want to see, facts, evidence, or reason be damned. Also known as ‘confirmation bias’ this factory installed feature of the human condition seems to particularly live up to its promise when it comes to the trading racket. Throw in a few wild swings and the bulls will regard each drive lower as an obvious dip buying opportunity while the bears see it as clear confirmation that the prevailing trend is weakening.
‘May you live in interesting times’ is an apocryphal expression often incorrectly attributed to being an ancient Chinese curse. Whoever actually coined it we will probably never know, but it’s clear to me that he or she was probably of advanced age and, having experienced a crisis or two, understood quite well the potential disruptive effects of large scale events.
As if we hadn’t already suffered enough lately, today’s event roster includes this month’s FOMC minutes being delivered around 2:00pm Eastern (18:00 GMT) plus ECB board member Peter Praet delivering a speech shortly after. Which means markets across the board will most likely be stuck in nail-biting hibernation mode until then. To keep my rowdy rabble entertained I’ll do a quick and dirty momo update as I’m seeing some interesting developments.
The Emotional Purgatory Of Cognitive Biases – Part 1
